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Personally speaking, CSI stands for "can't see it."
And we don't mean "can't see it" as in "can't find it." Episodes of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and its two spinoffs, CSI: Miami and CSI: New York, are available virtually 24 hours a day.
Rather, we mean "can't see it" as in "don't get it."
William Petersen (Gil Grissom on CSI), David Caruso (Horatio Cane on CSI: Miami) and Gary Sinise (Mac Taylor on CSI: New York) always are squinting and staring at me. They dramatically rip off their sunglasses, or dramatically put them back on, like stage actors in the 1940s.
They speak in low growls. Imagine Clint Eastwood with a chest cold. We don't know whether to hide behind them or hide from them.
With the season-finales of the three CSI shows scheduled for this week on CBS and CTV (Miami last night, New York tomorrow and the original on Thursday), this is as good a time as any to express our puzzlement over their spectacular popularity.
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If you ever gaze at the weekly roundup of the most-watched TV shows in Canada, all three CSI franchises regularly are in the top 10, if not the top five. We swear, if it weren't for CSI, House and a double-dip of American Idol every week, the top-rated program in the country still might be reruns of the old Tommy Hunter Show.
The three CSI series are decent enough, of course. But from the perspective of innovation and execution, are they really good enough to deserve such fierce, unwavering loyalty?
Law & Order essentially was replaced by CSI as the dominant police-related model on TV, and we were bigger fans of the former (although we lost some interest in Law & Order when Jill Hennessy left ... wonder why?).
Like CSI, Law & Order also has two children currently on the air, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and Law & Order: Criminal Intent. Admission: We often get those two Law & Order spinoffs and CSI: New York mixed up.
In a recent interview with Canadian songstress Nelly Furtado, for example, we mentioned her appearance on Law & Order: SVU. Oops. Nelly corrected us. It actually was CSI: New York. And we even had seen the episode! Embarrassing.
Anyway, even though the Law & Order blueprint is past its prime, in its heyday those shows were smarter than the CSI shows, we believe. We'll take Sam Waterston's portrayal of Jack McCoy over Grissom, Horatio or Mac, any day.
What's more, the dialogue in CSI always has struck us as pompously empty and cliche-laden. Someone will say, "Like a bad penny, some people just keep showing up" -- and it's not a joke.
In terms of slickness, though, CSI trumps Law & Order, and most TV dramas, by far. The computer graphics are cool, albeit a little gross. And we admit, we'd love to work in that CSI: Miami office. There just aren't a lot of pastel colours surrounding my desk here at good ol' Sun Media.
Nonetheless, if we limit this discussion to the shows themselves, we need your help. Is the success of CSI the ultimate example of style over substance? Or is it more than that?
If you're a regular viewer of CSI, CSI: New York or CSI: Miami, please send us an e-mail and tell us what got you hooked. And we don't really need to hear how stupid we are. We get enough of that at home.
This is a good-natured request. We're not saying we're right and you're wrong. What we're admitting is, for whatever reason, the CSI phenomenon has escaped us.
When it comes to CSI, please tell us: "CS-why?"